Tatas Vs Mamata’s Govt in Court over Singur

Kolkata: The battle over the Singur land, the original site where Tata’s Nano factory was about to come up, has reached court now as the Calcutta High Court has accepted the Tata Motors petition.

Courtesy: The Telegraph

On Wednesday Tata Motors filed the petition against the Singur Land Rehabilitation and Development Bill (2011) that enabled the state government to return the lands to unwilling farmers. The bill was passed on June 14 amidst heated arguments and walk outs be the opposition.

The Tata Motors legal team demanded an interim injunction restraining the government form implementing the Singur bill and restoration of status quo in the area quashing the Hooghly notification for vesting the site of dispute.

Although the HC has accepted the petition they did not refuse any interim order.

The company lawyers blamed the politics by both the previous Left government and current regime for the stalemate and exit of the Nano factory, without naming anyone.

Appearing for Tata Motors Barrister Samaraditya Pal made a distinction between the state and the government and alleged that the “very people who created the lawless situation are now in power.” He further added that “politics should be behind economics but sadly it is ahead today and the common people are the sufferer.”

The lawyers for Tata Motors are Siddhartha Mitra and Samaraditya Pal. The state government was represented by advocate-general Anindya Mitra, Kalyan Bandopadhyay and government pleader Ashok Banerjee in the courtroom of Justice Saumitra Pal.

Justice Pal, however, did not pass any interim order as the advocate general pleaded that no such order should be passed before listening to the state government. He also assured the court that Tata Motors need not worry about the property as adequate security measures have been taken.

Around 500 security personnel are on duty in Singur.

The crux of the Tata’s argument was that the said bill was unconstitutional. They further argued that the very ground for the Singur bill that the Tata Motors abandoned the project is erroneous as the company did not leave the site on its own, but was forced to put it down after the agitation led by a political party, that is “now in power”.

The court room witnessed some heated argument in the three hour long hearing.

Mamata Banerjee was successful in ousting the Left government from the state over the land acquisition issue.